Wholewheat Blueberry Muffins (Dairy Free and Delicious)

January 30, 2017 This post may contain affiliate links.

When we first started the clean eating thing, I wasn’t really sure where we were going to go with it. My priority was eating real food and also getting chemicals and preservatives out of our diet. but not so much the quality of the ingredients I was using. When I look back at past recipes, there are many where I would use white flour instead of wholewheat. To be honest, I was hesitant to make drastic changes as I wasn’t overly confident that my family would be OK with eating 100% wholewheat foods.

Now regardless of what anyone may tell you, (unless you’re gluten sensitive) there is nothing wrong with good ol’ organic plain flour. In fact there are some recipes where I will use it simply because it tastes or works better. Yes, it has been mechanically processed and a lot of the good stuff taken out, but if it means you are baking at home instead of buying manufactured and processed foods, well do you know what? Who cares. You’ve made a step in the right direction. There are too many ideas on what amounts to a good diet. Too many. And most of the time they contradict each too, so it doesn’t make it easy for us Moms just trying to get it right.

I get emails every day from other Moms disagreeing with my choice of canned goods or dried fruit I may used in a recipe. And that’s OK.

It was easy to cut out chemicals, but not so easy to get my family used to eating wholegrain textured baking. I had to slowly ease them in to it by replacing half the white flour with wholewheat in many of my recipes then playing around with sweetness and density. Wholewheat flour makes a recipe a lot denser and the nuttier flavor also messes with the usual sweetness. It wasn’t as easy as just switching out the the white flour for wholewheat. It took a while to get to the stage where I could make a 100% wholegrain recipe without complaints.

These blueberry muffins are a good example of a recipe that has evolved with my family. My original recipe used organic white flour as a base ingredient. And it was a good place to start, but I knew I could improve on them by reducing the amount of sugar and upping the goods grains. I’ve also started using coconut oil quite a bit in my baking. It works amazingly well in most recipes as a replacement for butter.

My children have also evolved in their tastes. They are now all used to eating wholegrain foods and actually prefer the taste. Their taste buds have definitely changed along the way which makes eating real food a lot easier.

My wholewheat blueberry muffins have been a labour of love. It took me a while to fine tune the recipe that:

a. suited my family,

b. could be enjoyed right out the oven, and

c. the next day in lunch boxes and

d. could also last up to two months in the freezer. Not that they ever get to hang around there that long. Generally, in our family, if they are in the freezer for more than a week, they weren’t that good to start.

What is the best flour to use?

Grains are getting boo hoo’ed by the health industry at the moment. And there is a genuine issue with gluten intolerance. An estimated 1% of the American population deal with this issue – it does, however, leave a staggeringly large 99% of us OK to eat whole grains. All grains are not created equal. I stay away from processed grains as much as possible and choose organic every time.

I get most of my grains and flours from Bobs Red Mill. It’s a brand I trust and use everyday in my kitchen. This is my go to whole wheat flour that I use daily ( 100% Stone Ground Whole Wheat Flour, 5lbs). It took me a while to find a product that I was happy with. The quality and taste of bobs red mill products are excellent and their values as a company make feel happy to use them. I’m a super fan.